


Merry Christmas, Dr. Oliver

by rhiannonhero



Category: As the World Turns
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-01-26
Updated: 2011-01-26
Packaged: 2017-10-15 02:55:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,618
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/156304
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rhiannonhero/pseuds/rhiannonhero
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Thank you to my beta readers for their wonderful support and encouragement: <span><a href="http://peggin.livejournal.com/profile"><img/></a><a href="http://peggin.livejournal.com/"><b>peggin</b></a></span>, <span><a href="http://users.livejournal.com/_alicesprings/profile"><img/></a><a href="http://users.livejournal.com/_alicesprings/"><b>_alicesprings</b></a></span>, and <span><a href="http://amelialourdes.livejournal.com/profile"><img/></a><a href="http://amelialourdes.livejournal.com/"><b>amelialourdes</b></a></span>.</p>
    </blockquote>





	Merry Christmas, Dr. Oliver

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to my beta readers for their wonderful support and encouragement: [](http://peggin.livejournal.com/profile)[**peggin**](http://peggin.livejournal.com/) , [](http://users.livejournal.com/_alicesprings/profile)[**_alicesprings**](http://users.livejournal.com/_alicesprings/) , and [](http://amelialourdes.livejournal.com/profile)[**amelialourdes**](http://amelialourdes.livejournal.com/).

Reid knows that Christmas is coming. There's really no avoiding it. There are wreaths and tinsel all over the hospital, the nurses have put little light-up trees at their stations, and people keep saying, "Merry Christmas, Dr. Oliver."

The holiday mood, always vaguely offensive to his grumbling sensibilities, is especially cheery, and thus chaffing, in Oakdale, where people are downright _jolly_ about it. Then there's the night he comes home after a four hour surgery to find a wreath on the apartment door. He pauses, staring at it a moment. He knows damn well who put it there. With a shrug, he twists the key, and walks in to a freaking winter wonderland.

"What the…wait, wait…were we hit by a Baby Jesus blizzard in here?" Reid asks, blinking and too stunned to even take off his coat.

Luke's in the kitchen, and he's grinning as he adds some more tinsel to the tiny Christmas tree he's set up on the counter. There are colored lights along the edges of the cabinets, there's greenery lining the window casings, and _Christmas music_ is playing on the stereo.

"Well, what do you think?" Luke asks. He waves his arm around and says, "It's our first Christmas together. I wanted it to be special."

Reid thinks he's going to go into insulin shock from the sheer sweetness of Luke's expression coupled with the sentimentality glittering all around him. “I think you must have missed the memo when I said that I don’t do Christmas.”

Luke sighs, rolls his eyes, and smirks. “Like how you don’t do relationships, or weddings, or family gatherings, or—“

“No, like how I don’t do Christmas,” Reid says, turning away from Luke to hang up his jacket.

“Seriously?” Luke asks, and then mocks Reid playfully. “Fine, Mr. ‘I-Don’t-Do-Things-That-Involve-People-Or-Fun’, care to share why not? I mean, come on, Reid, lighten up; it’s _Christmas_.”

Reid doesn’t look at Luke, hoping that maybe if he’s matter of fact about it, Luke will let the matter drop. He doubts it. “Exactly,” he says.

He hears Luke approaching him, can sense him moving across the room, and knows that he’s probably got his arms crossed over his chest, and a look of determination on his face. Reid knows this, but he stays focused on the stack of bills tossed in the basket next to the door. The phone bill. The water bill. Luke’s hand on his preventing him from flipping further.

“Reid.”

Reid sighs, pinches the bridge of his nose, and says, “It’s never been a special day. I don’t celebrate it. The hypocrisy. It bugs me. That’s all.”

Luke says, “And time with friends and family, not to mention _presents_ , doesn’t at all make up for that.”

Reid gives him a look, and Luke says, “Oh, right, I forgot who I’m talking to here. No friends,” Luke teases, but suddenly he goes solemn. “And your parents are gone. God, Reid. I’m sorry. Is that what this is about?” Luke’s voice has gone tender and concerned now.

“Of course not. Don’t get all _emotional_ on me,” Reid says.

But Luke guides him over the sofa, presses him down against the cushions, and he’s being all handsy now, and Reid likes that, even if he doesn’t like the conversation. The colored lights are glittering out of the corner of Reid’s eye, and even the sofa has a new red and green blanket for the season. Who knew Luke was such a little homemaker? Especially when it’s not even his home. The place hasn’t looked so damn lived in since Katie and Jacob moved to Chris’ place.

Luke presses on. “So, what? Do you miss your folks? Or…wait, are you Jewish?”

Reid laughs at that. “No. Not Jewish. Just poor. And my uncle’s idea of Christmas was pretty miserable, so I don’t have a lot of fond memories.” Reid waggles his fingers at Luke, who’s smiling with soft affection now. “Let me guess – your family had the tree, loads of presents, a nice dinner, and you felt surrounded by love and the warm glow of Christmas…magic, or something.”

“Yeah, we did,” Luke says, softly. He turns so that he’s pressing his shin against Reid’s hip, and he’s got one hand tangled in the back of Reid’s hair, and the other brushing over Reid’s cheek. “I wish I knew you back then.”

Reid’s dismissive. “No you don’t. I was terrible and obnoxious to be around.”

“Ah, so, pretty much the same then,” Luke says.

Reid grins briefly, amazed at how Luke reaches right into him somehow, and touches him in ways he finds terrifying and necessary.

“Yeah,” he says, and then finds himself babbling, telling Luke more than he intends. “Angus…I’ll tell you what he celebrated. He celebrated chess victories. Win a tournament, get a clap on the back, and maybe a few minutes of peace. Then it was back to working for the next one. Christmas, New Year, Halloween, whatever, all just a distraction from the business of chess.” Reid moves a pretend chess piece, and says, “Check.”

“Reid,” Luke says and pets Reid’s hair.

Reid shrugs. “Who has the time for the sentimental nonsense anyway? It’s just a chance for big business canker sores, ruining the face of humanity, to gobble up tons of money by suckering people into giving each other crap no one–“

“So,” Luke interrupts him. “In other words, while everyone else your age had Christmas, you had chess… and Angus.”

Reid rolls his eyes. “If you want to put it like that.”

“But that doesn’t explain why you don’t like Christmas now.”

“I didn’t say I don’t like it. I said I don't _do_ it. Who needs it? I’ve got my work.”

“And me,” Luke says. “That’s something to celebrate isn’t it?”

“I think I celebrated that at the Thanksgiving dinner you forced on me with all the members of your lunatic family. The food was good, though.”

“You like Natalie,” Luke says.

Reid shrugs. “She’s a good kid. And Ethan’s okay. He’s probably going to play football, though.” He shakes his head and rolls his eyes over that.

“And that’s a problem, why?” Luke asks, obviously amused and on the verge of laughing.

“If you had any idea the number of neurological injuries associated with that sport on an annual basis,” Reid begins, but Luke doesn’t let him get going on the topic.

“So, was it just that you didn’t get a Christmas, or did Angus make it bad in other ways.”

Reid sighs. He doesn’t know how he feels about how much Luke knows or has guessed about his life with Angus. It wasn’t popsicles and balloons, but it wasn’t all abuse. At least Angus rarely hit him, and if he was abusive in other ways, Reid doesn’t know why he should dwell on that.

“It wasn’t fun,” Reid says. “I couldn’t wait to get out of there.”

“That bad?”

“ We had a neighbor, Old Man Rogers, and he’d put out lights every year. I guess I liked that. At least he was an old guy, not some bratty kid who was going to get nearly every G.I. Joe figure known to mankind and then cry he didn’t get the only one his parents couldn’t find.”

“Did you ever get a present?” Luke asks.

Reid shrugs. “Why does it matter?” He sighs. “Before my parents died. It seems like I remember that Christmas was…better, but I don’t know. I was a little kid. Angus is what I remember best, and it was…what it was.”

“And what was that?” Luke whispers.

“It’s pointless to think about it now,” Reid says, but when Luke tilts his head and gives him that look, he goes on. It’s hard, because Reid doesn’t like to think of it. “One Christmas, I was twelve, I remember...the light from the t.v. was kind of flickering. Some Christmas special. Angus was drinking beer, and I had a tournament the next day.” Reid pauses to breathe a moment. “When he caught me looking at the set instead of studying…” Reid trails off.

It’s not like Angus hit him that night, but he’d grabbed him by the collar, and said things that let Reid know that he was Angus’ ticket, and that’s all he was.

“He thought I owed him,” Reid says, and then pinches the bridge of his nose, shakes his head, and tries to shrug it off. “He thought a lot of crap that doesn’t matter now.”

Luke looks like he’s going to kiss Reid, just like he always does whenever Reid reveals anything about his childhood. Reid doesn’t understand it, but the more he’s a babbling loser the more Luke seems to want him. This, at least, is something Reid can deal with.

Reid gazes at Luke and he knows that his affection is spread all over his face. He’s heard the nurses gossip about how he’s ga-ga for Luke, and he’s worried that it’s affecting his reputation as an asshole, but there’s nothing to be done about it. Luke just brings out the idiot in him.

“I put the Christmas tree in the bedroom,” Luke says. His voice is rough and Reid can see how dilated his eyes are, and when Luke licks his lips, Reid leans forward to kiss them. Luke’s warm and hard against him, and the sofa cradles Reid’s back as Luke presses him down, and crawls on top of him.

“Is that a come on?” Reid murmurs. “Am I supposed to find that hot?”

Luke’s covering Reid, his hands gathering Reid up under him protectively. He ignores Reid’s questions. “I want to give you good Christmases forever to make up for the bad ones,” Luke whispers, and Reid can’t help but smile at that, because he knows that Luke means it so earnestly.

Luke kisses him hard, and long, and Reid slides his hands up under Luke’s shirt, following the path of his spine down, and then he shoves his hands into Luke’s pants, grabbing Luke’s firm ass, to pull him down and tight against him.

“I know you have to work,” Luke says against his mouth. “On Christmas Day. But I’ll be here waiting when you get home.” Luke kisses his ear, and the side of his jaw. “I’ll have food, and wine for you, and you can sleep, or eat, or we can have sex, or whatever you want, but it’ll be our Christmas, okay? Something good.”

Reid rumbles in agreement, and presses his hips up against Luke’s thighs, hoping to get a little more pressure on his cock. He buries his nose against Luke’s neck, inhaling his scent, and kisses the pulse thudding there.

“And I’m gonna leave the decorations, and you’re gonna like ‘em,” Luke says gruffly, kissing and nuzzling Reid’s mouth and jaw.

“Already do,” Reid admits. It’s true; the place looks great. Ridiculous, but great.

Luke sits up and straddles him then, a smug, gleeful expression on his face. “I knew it! You’re all bluster! I knew you loved it.”

Reid just looks at him, and Luke is smiling like he does when Reid thinks that maybe Luke will burst with happiness, and the fact that _he_ inspires that look amazes Reid every day.

“Well, don’t get too excited. I’ll still forget your birthday,” Reid says.

Luke blinks slowly, presses his ass against Reid’s erection, and he smiles. “I don’t care. If you remember to come home to me, I don’t care.”

“Where else would I go?” Reid asks, incredulous.

He can’t think of anywhere, other than possibly burrowing inside of a brain, that he’d rather be, and even that’s just an old thought, something he feels he’s in the process of outgrowing. It reminds him of the coats he outgrew as a kid, the ones he used to huddle in to stay warm, to stay out of sight. And like the coats, the old thoughts are too small to do the job anymore. His new thoughts, the ones where he feels the most safe, all involve brown eyes, trembling arms, and Luke opening up to him, holding him, surrounding him, and protecting him. Now, when he’s scared, that’s the only place he wants to go.

“Move in,” Reid says. He pulls Luke down against him again, and skims his hands up Luke’s back. He runs his fingertips over Luke’s transplant scar, and he waits, his breath caught, his heart thudding. He wants it all. He’s told Luke as much. He’s in this thing now, and there’s only forward from here.

Luke stops rolling his hips against Reid’s thighs. He stares down at Reid with a look of amazement and he says, “Wow, you really liked the Christmas decorations, didn’t you? I should have gone for it at Halloween.”

“What’s that mean?” Reid asks. “Is that a yes?”

Luke grins and kind of laughs, but he’s happy. Reid knows. He knows Luke’s every subtle and unsubtle expression and tone.

“It’s a definite yes, as in ‘hell, yes’, as in, ‘took you long enough to ask me, yes’,” Luke chuckles.

“I thought you were all about taking it slow,” Reid drawls the last word out long and mocking.

“Well, Dr. Oliver,” Luke says, licking his lips, and gazing down at Reid’s mouth. “I would’ve thought you’d have figured out that I ditched slow a long time ago.”

“Oh, yeah?”

“Yeah. Around the same time I sent Katie away for the weekend with Chris, called your nurses to rearrange your schedule, stocked your refrigerator with provisions, and locked you in your bedroom for a few days.”

“Best two days of my life,” Reid admits.

“You’re welcome,” Luke says, glowing and looking smugly coy.

“So, Mr. Snyder….” The tinsel and glittering lights casts a merry shimmer over the room. His cock is aching and he wants to be buried balls deep in Luke as soon as possible. The flush on Luke’s cheeks and the heat in his eyes only makes Reid want him more, and so he asks, waggling his brows, and in his best seductive voice, “Are you gonna show me your Christmas tree?”

He’s rewarded by Luke’s laughter and a hand up from the couch. Luke’s very physical as he guides Reid to the bedroom, his hands all over Reid like he doesn’t want to let go.

Reid has to admit that the tree is beautiful. It’s exactly the right size for the room, with tiny twinkling lights wrapped around each limb, and tasteful ornaments that look like they probably cost a bundle, but Reid’s not asking.

“Do you like it?” Luke asks, his breath hot against Reid’s cheek, as he wraps his arms around Reid’s chest from behind, and uses his slight height advantage to rest his head on Reid’s shoulder.

Reid presses his ass back against Luke’s hard-on, and said, “It’s nice, Mr. Snyder. I’m impressed.”

“Are we talking about the tree?” Luke laughs.

“It’s innuendo. And, yes, the tree is nice. If you were naked right now, it would be nicer.”

Luke kisses his neck, and Reid turns around to unwrap the best present he never expected to get.

***

Later, sated in the glow of the twinkling lights, his knees stinging a little with rug-burn, and two fingers buried in Luke’s still twitching ass, Reid says, “I guess Christmas won’t be too bad. With you around.”

Luke grins and kisses Reid’s lips, and then tenderly strokes a hand over Reid’s hair, looking at him in the way that makes Reid feel like he’s very loved.

Luke whispers, “Merry Christmas, Dr. Oliver.”

And when Luke says it, it’s not irritating at all. In fact, he kind of likes it. A lot.

THE END


End file.
